


River of Dreams

by rainbowstrlght



Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-04
Updated: 2012-03-04
Packaged: 2017-11-01 02:57:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/351178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainbowstrlght/pseuds/rainbowstrlght
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zach explodes at his mother and runs away from home. Trying to cool off in the park, he meets a strange young boy that he's inexplicably drawn to.</p>
<p>(Teen AU, written for the "explorer" square on <a href="http://au-bingo.livejournal.com/">AU Bingo</a>.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	River of Dreams

 

 

Fuck Joey, fuck Mama—fuck _all_ of them. Zach had to get out of there.

The screen door slammed behind him, and he ignored the fervent and angry calling of voices it trapped in the house. Zach wasn’t going to think about it—wasn’t going to think about how badly that conversation had just gone. Even in his wildest dreams he didn’t think anyone would get that angry with him. They had thrown him for a loop, and Zach had to center himself and find his footing again.

Zach sped into a jog, which steadily built into a run as he wanted to just _go_. Run block after block until he reached the dead end by the park, connected by a bridge across railroad tracks behind his old junior high school.  It was a place he wasn’t supposed to go to—dealers and gangs and whatever else—but in the daytime he snuck there all the time, relishing all the places to hide and get lost.

When he was eight, he went there with Alison to play house in the dirt ledge under the bridge. When he was 12, he went there with Joey to throw things and carve initials into the trees. And now, at 15, he went there sometimes to dream—to figure out if the park really seemed as endless as it did from within.

Life seemed fairly endless. School seemed endless. The days were an itch beneath his skin. He wanted to just _grow up_ already. Get the fuck out of Pittsburgh and live his own life—maybe _start_ his life in college, where people wouldn’t know him for the awkward mess he was right now. Maybe life wouldn’t be as confusing, or pointless.

Zach reached the dead end, barely slowly down as he crossed the bridge to the park. Planks of wood rattled under his feet, reminding him it was a long drop to the train tracks below. It was a sensual reminder that he was crossing into somewhere else, almost to safety. In a moment he was there, his hand grasping the trunk of a young tree as he veered off the park path, going into the woods.

The sun was low, meaning dusk would be there soon, but Zach didn’t care. He was already in trouble for running, and probably in deep for missing dinner and upsetting Mama. He remembered her face—anguished, disappointed. _Disbelieving_. As if Zach hadn’t thought this through often enough, had decided he liked boys better than girls overnight. He thought Mama would understand that better than anyone—parents were supposed to know these things, right? Take one look at you, and know all the things you hid inside.

When Zach walked the halls at school, he felt like people could just _look_ at him and know. He would be painted gay like a skunk with its stripe. Explanation wouldn’t be necessary—redundant, really.

But even Joey had sputtered at the dining room table, as if Zach had just been _dying_ to upset Mama and ruin the world. As if Zach was going through a phase of hurting everyone and making their lives worse.

And, okay—maybe Zach was. He had been called into the principal’s office a few weeks ago, almost suspended for a series of fights. Then just last week he had been stopped by officers for smoking a cigarette near school grounds—and during school hours, to boot. Scolded and then escorted home, _oh joy_.

Zach decided ultimately to find the ledge under the bridge, and thankfully it was vacant. He needed to sit against the graffiti-ed rock wall and calm his breathing, think in silence. Or perhaps he could throw his legs over the ledge and look down at the rickety train tracks—think about how far the world was down below and how much that would hurt.

The ground was cold beneath his ass, but the sun shone golden over rusted tracks. Zach couldn’t recall the last time he heard a train down here—one must still run through, right? Otherwise they’d tear it all down—the nebulous _they_ , whomever they would be. Probably the same people to yell at him for being down here in the first place.

Zach took a deep breath—okay, he was gay. Mama had to accept that. But Zach could also admit it had been the worst possible timing. He had just been fed up with all the nitpicking. Mama had been praising Joey in being fucking badass baseball player of the year, or whatever it was, and then… those _eyes_. Disapproving ones had coursed over Zach’s form, and Zach could hear it coming— _Well. Zach will get there._

What if he already was there? What if this was the best Zach ever got. A geek and a nerd that would rather watch hours of _Star Trek_ than join the track team. Would rather read endless words after words and memorize them, perhaps study them the rest of his life. Perhaps run away and become a beatnik and meet a tall, handsome man in a café somewhere—maybe stupidly reading poetry, because Zach liked poets.

But in the end, it was all a fear of remaining the same. Maybe Zach would always be like this, and that had started to eat him up inside. He would run away to spare Mama the truth, to make sure he was the same Zach she always depended on. But the truth had caught up with Zach, burrowed its way out of Zach’s throat until he couldn’t swallow it anymore—the truth needing to spoil Joey’s nice moment, Mama’s pleasant meal, and Zach’s convenient silence.

Zach breathed out, the huff turning into cloud. He rubbed his arms, just realizing it was getting cold outside—autumn, and all that jazz. But it felt nice, to be soaked through with a chill. To feel something deep in his bones.

He was about to pull his legs under him, elbows on knees, when a flash caught the corner of his eye—maybe it was the sun off the tracks. But when Zach leaned further over the edge, there was another head below him, kicking gravel and ignoring Zach’s existence.

That was nice—Zach could retreat quietly, if need be. But instead he kept watching as the slim and gangly figure held his arms out to the side, as if keeping balance on the shifting gravel. Gravel close to the train tracks—that wasn’t safe, was it? But the boy below him didn’t seem to care, as if he were also lost in thought like Zach himself.

When the figure actually jumped on the metal railings, Zach opened his mouth.

“A train might still go through here, you know.”

It was the uncoolest thing to say, yet Zach didn’t need witnessing somebody’s stupid death on his list of fuck-ups.

And the boy didn’t seem to mind much. He didn’t seem surprised to hear a voice—didn’t seem surprised that Zach had been watching him. He didn’t even move from the train tracks.

“Not anymore,” was all he said, which strangely echoed off the tunnel of space between rock walls.

Zach swallowed—he sort of felt dumb, but that was nothing new. “You’re just making me nervous.”

He expected the boy to sneer at him, maybe mock him for being concerned. But instead he hopped off the tracks, shrugging as he looked up at the ledge, meeting Zach’s eyes for the first time.

And it was strange, that look. It reminded Zach of being followed by paintings at a gallery; dead eyes that had no soul, yet tracked you across a room.

Yet these were blue. Translucent blue that could be gray, that could actually be glass.

“I’m Chris,” said the figure, and the words still echoed under the bridge.

“I’m Zach”—a teen wishing it weren’t quite so dark and eerie, maybe a bit warmer.

But a smile lit up Chris’ face. The teeth white and lighting up his features, making him more human with every passing second.

Zach found himself smiling back, leaning a little further over the edge. “Where are you from?”

“ _Around_ ,” Chris said, a finger twirling in abstraction. “You?”

Zach sighed. “Around.”

Chris turned his head to the side, then quickly glanced at Zach before moving to the rock wall. There was a set of crumbly stairs that Zach had never dared to try, but Chris didn’t seem to care about safety, period. Zach watched as he took two at a time, the railing wobbly as Chris touched it once or twice.

Zach leaned away as Chris approached, dropping to sit next to him. There was an easy-going friendliness that Zach rarely saw—at school, kids clung to cliques and generally avoided anyone that was different. People this friendly usually had an agenda. But Chris merely smiled, leaning back on his arms as he glanced from Zach to the park and back to the train tracks.

Finally he asked, “What are you doing around here?”

Zach shrugged in response. He didn’t know whether to be honest and possibly spook the only person speaking to him, or lie to keep Chris’ company. Which—why did he care about his company, anyway? He’d probably never see this Chris person again.

Zach looked to the dirt floor of the ledge, tapping a finger. “Getting away from home. You?”

Maybe Chris shrugged as well. “Same.”

They were silent a few more moments, before Chris continued. “Dad and I had a fight.”

Zach glanced up to see Chris watching the tail-end of the sunset, dark pinks now turning into bruised blues.

“Mama—well, my mom and I had a fight, too.” Zach looked back to the dirt; he didn’t want to know if Chris was paying attention to him. “I had to get away for a bit.”

There was more silence, and Zach rushed on before bravery left him. “I told my mom I was a fag.”

Zach winced at himself—why did he even use that word? It was stupidly offensive. Yet that’s actually what he had said in the moment of bursting, too full of other people’s hate. Again, he hadn’t exactly been polite about it.

More silence, and Zach thought about leaving—he had ruined it all. Of _course_ he had ruined it all. Again. It was turning into _The Zach Quinto Way_.

“Some people suck cock. No big deal. I mean, I’d be pretty bummed if nobody ever did.”

Zach looked up sharply, wanting to say the _What?_ on his tongue. But Chris was looking at him slyly, a shy glance from a shadowed profile.

Zach breathed a sigh of relief—not freaked out, then. It was a start.

“What was the fight with your dad about?” It felt almost too personal, but then, Zach _had_ just admitted to being gay.

Chris grimaced. “Something stupid—probably about borrowing the car. We fought about everything, really. I don’t even remember anymore.” Chris shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

The past tense hadn’t slipped Zach’s notice—he _lived_ by words. And considering the enigma before him, he was paying attention to every single one.

“You’re using—are you—?”

But a laugh from above cut off Zach’s question. In the shade of darkness, both Zach and Chris jerked to stare at the bridge, hearing footsteps on the planks.

_Adults_. Gang members, maybe. Prostitutes. Zach could hear his mother’s tirade now— _crack whores with needles and tattoos._

Zach wasn’t looking forward to meeting them, and he looked around wildly for a place to hide. But just as he made a dash for the stairs, Chris grabbed his arm and tugged him towards the forest.

“ _This way!_ ” Chris hissed in a whisper, and Zach wasted no time in disagreeing. The hand was warm as it entwined with Zach’s fingers, insistent in dragging him over logs and between trees and deeper and deeper into dense woods. The leaves of fall crunched under their feet, but no one came after them; Chris making quick work of getting them lost.

When they stopped to catch their breath, Zach looked up to gauge where he might be. It was a decent-sized park, but he should be able to orientate himself from anywhere. Usually the bridge and the school were his markers, but this time—actually, Zach had _no_ clue where he was.

_Great_. If he actually did get lost here, he’d probably never live it down. It’d be like drowning in a shallow pond, wouldn’t it? One you could stand in.

But Chris gave him a soft smile, as if he were glad to be lost with him, and—well, Zach couldn’t give a damn about the repercussions, anymore. Mama likely had the police called by now, but it’d require an army to drag Zach away from this boy. This cute boy whose eyes were watching him carefully, as if drinking him in, as if Zach were someone fascinating and ever worth looking at.

“Where are we?” Zach whispered, despite his desires to just keep staring, perhaps to lean against the trees and stare all night.

Chris pointed behind them. “School’s over there.”

They were so turned around. Zach never went this far—it was close to a highway that boxed the park in. If they went any further, they’d likely reach some fences, maybe the highway itself—

“Come on,” Chris said quietly, and Zach couldn’t help but follow—their hands still entwined, but loose and dangling. Chris seemed to have no fear, and that seemed to include Zach ever letting go. He forged ahead, not seeming to care they’d bump into the highway—or hell, that they might encounter other people. Gang members probably didn’t keep to the bridge, really.

But the chilled night air became less discomfiting, the goosebumps on Zach’s skin thrilling to his senses. He looked above at the night sky, trying to find stars, but not really disappointed at only city lights and cloud. They traveled a while in silence, and it was very peaceful, the type of serenity that Zach had been seeking. They walked in leaves and smelled the dirt of nature, and it became a meditation.

Maybe Zach _could_ be more. He felt so much more, just holding Chris’ hand. What if he could hold his hand forever? Or maybe a few more times, in the future. Or somebody else’s, whose skin was just as soft and comforting—someone who made his heart speed just like this, and took him on a journey to places he never dared to go, to places he never even dreamed of.

There were more journeys, weren’t there? There had even been an expedition in his own neighborhood, his own backyard, and Zach had never known it until now.

Eventually the park thinned out to the highway, but instead of pavement and rushing cars there was a small stream and another bridge. If Zach had thought about it, the highway _did_ seem to be above the park—it made sense for this bridge to be here, although it looked like the home of a troll rather than anything majestic.

Chris continued to drag him towards it, but Zach remembered something else—homeless, more gang members. His mother would have an aneurysm at this point, no doubt, if she had any clue where he was.

But she likely didn’t. What time was it? Was Zach making the whole situation worse by still being out? Could he get into even further trouble if she had called the police and they were looking for him?

But as they neared the center of the short tunnel, Chris turned to him with another understanding smile. “We’re in the cave. You leave all your worries outside—it’s a rule. Got it?”

It was just the excuse Zach needed, although his mind still felt tinged with anxiety. Chris dragged them to lean against a cement wall, and they went down to their knees together, then sat on their behinds, legs bent in front of them. Thighs touched and Zach reveled in the heat between them, their hands still joined.

Maybe Chris was gay, too. Perhaps that’s what the fight had really been about.

“See this river, here?” Chris leaned forward to point, his shoulder brushing Zach’s. “You can tell it anything and it drags the words away—far, far away.”

Zach could barely make it out in the darkness. It was rather tiny, actually—probably a run-off from some business, or stream, or some distant lake. Hardly a river at all. Yet Zach could barely remember his own name right now, with Chris’ breath so close to his ear—they could be near the Atlantic Ocean, and Zach probably wouldn’t remember the name for it. He wasn’t going to judge these things.   

Chris continued whispering, closer still, “It doesn’t have to be anything bad. It takes away dreams, too—maybe to the right people, maybe to the woods. Holds them here for you, until you’re brave enough to come back for them.”

Zach felt his chest tighten. He choked on the fear rising from his stomach—all the worry he had kept buried down there, about being a worthless and useless piece of shit. About not having any purpose, about never having any purpose.

He could never be Joey—sports champ, smart as hell, and yet using his scholarships to study _photography_. Art, of all things! Something you really had to be talented at, and yet his mother had only been awed at _that_ pronouncement.

Zach turned his head to look at Chris, and was startled to see that Chris had been watching him, studying him closely. Who ever did that? Except Zach, of course. Like a bug on the wall, trying to figure out how people worked.

Chris turned his gaze to the water. “I keep telling the river I want to be alive again. That I want to get out of these woods, see my dad. I wish—I wish I could apologize.” Chris huffed a humorless laugh. “I said some really mean shit—and it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that I died before I could tell him I was all wrong. I was wrong about whatever I yelled at him about, because—because I _do_ love him. I never hated him, not even for a moment.”

Chris sucked in a deep breath, and Zach wondered why the dead would breathe. Was it a habit? If breathing was a habit, even when it meant nothing, were grief and worry and sadness the same thing? You could cast them off in death, but you were too used to the anchors, allowing them to drag you when you didn’t need them anymore.

Zach turned to look at the river—still hard to see, but maybe wider than he originally thought. It was so dark that Zach could picture it into something majestic, if he wanted to. Make it deep and dark and colder than ice, willing to suck the life from both of them.

“I want to be alive, too,” Zach whispered. “I want to be someone my Mama wants, someone that my dad would have liked.”

Wasn’t that the crux of it all? Zach could picture his dead father hating him, thinking his life in the car accident had been wasted to spare Zach. It was something Zach constantly fretted about, that he wasn’t good enough, that he wasn’t worth it, that he had no purpose—“I want to mean something.” Whatever _that_ meant.

Zach felt a hand on his neck, turning his chin. Chris was giving him a look of infinite patience, a look Zach recognized from his own mother. _Silly, silly Zach._

“You mean something to me.” A thumb was brushing his lower lip, almost as tender as Chris’ words. “I’ve only known you for a few hours, and you mean the _world_.”

Zach shut his eyes tight—no, no he would _not_ show how parched he had been for words like those. How he drank them in greedily, replaying them in his mind, over and over— _you mean the world_.

There was a ghost of breath on his lips, and truth be told, Zach would’ve given Chris anything in that moment. But it was the faintest of kisses—perhaps that was all Chris _could_ give, or take. When the breath moved away, Zach licked his lips and opened his eyes—blue, they were definitely blue. Like the Atlantic Ocean on a sunny day, brighter and lighter than any river Zach had ever seen.

It hurt his chest, tightening a knot that pained him further, the more Zach thought on it. If Chris was a ghost—if Chris couldn’t go home—if—

“Shhh,” Chris said softly, pulling Zach’s head down to his shoulder. An arm went around Zach’s body, and Zach wondered how a ghost could feel so warm. Maybe it was because Zach had been so cold—chilled to his soul, that even dead winter would feel like spring.

Zach turned his head to burrow into Chris’ bicep, the white t-shirt smelling of the woods. It was musky and damp and fragrant of pine needles, and Zach would likely never smell such things and think innocent thoughts ever again.

They slunk further down the wall, until Zach was tucked into Chris’ shoulder, trying hard not to fall asleep.

“You should,” Chris whispered. “That’s the best thing about being alive. You can dream, and dream as much as you want to, and the only thing that can ever stop you is death.”

Zach felt himself falling into it, helpless as Chris’ face slipped away from him, ebbed him into sleep.

***

When Zach woke up—sore and stiff before he even lifted his head—his first thought was, _she’s going to kill me_.

Daylight filtered into the tunnel, and Zach’s back protested as he lifted himself off gravel, his eyes adjusting to his surroundings.

Bridge. Stream. Forest. Zach twisted to look behind him, and—no, no he was alone. Completely alone.

His heart felt a bit empty at that. Out of the entire scenario of impossibilities—meeting a strange, cute boy in the woods, said boy holding his hand and saying _you mean the world,_ same boy being a ghost—maybe Zach had hoped for a miracle. Had silently sent it to the river of dreams.

Zach stood up gingerly, almost falling over from the complete uselessness of aching limbs. But he walked to the tiny trail of water, wondering bitterly if you could even _call_ it a river, much less a stream, considering he wouldn’t even need to leap to get to the other side; could straddle the damn thing by merely standing over it.

And yet—and yet, Zach stood before it anyway, silently thinking, _I hope we both find where we belong._

The thought stung at his eyes, but Zach looked towards the sunlight. He would have to go home now, figure out how _belonging_ meant to him. Likely while his mother simultaneously yelled and hugged him to death, possibly killing him in the process. But it would all be worth it. He knew that now, that living through it would be worth it.

Chris had been right. Only death stopped dreams, and Zach had wanted to die without even dreaming.

He walked out of from under the bridge, blinking back the bright world.


End file.
